MANSFIELD — Fourth grade students at Mansfield St. Peter’s School dressed up for one extra day the day after Halloween — but the costumes were not as grim.
In fact, they were quite the opposite. Each costume represented a different saint, to correspond with All Saints Day, the Catholic holiday that remembers all canonized saints.
“We also spend time praying and reflecting that we could also become saints someday,” said principal Michael Wasiniak.
To kick off the holy day, the school participated in a traditional mass, in which some fourth grade students read scripture from the pulpit. At one point, Associate Pastor Jeremy Miller lined the students at the front of the stage to ask each one which saint they dressed up as.
Answers varied from well-known saints such as Saint Peter and Saint Paul the Apostle to Saint Barbara, patron saint of fireworks.
“I’ve not heard of some of those,” Miller said to the gathered audience, who laughed in response.
He went on to say All Saints Day is about imitation and intercession.
“We do this partly because we want to look up to them. But we want to imitate them, too,” he said.
He then asked who the students looked up to, to which some students replied with athlete stars like Lionel Messi, LeBron James, Michael Jordan and John Elway.
“So if we do this for athletes we love, we should be able to do this in our spiritual lives,” Miller posed.
He explained that the saints honored by the Catholic church are also intercessors for prayers.
“They (saints) remind us that our saints are in heaven, constantly pleading on our behalf so that we may know Jesus better and love God more in our lives,” Miller said.
Students stayed dressed in their saint costumes through Tuesday. Wasiniak said the students will recollect the lives of the saints they represent and later in the day enjoyed a party.
“It’s a day we can celebrate those who have gone before us who have been declared saints,” Wasiniak explained.
The holy day holds a special place in the principal’s heart, too. If he was given the chance to dress up like the fourth grade students, he said he would have chosen to dress up as Saint Michael the Archangel.
